The fading era of the American Navy frigate will slip a little further on Friday when the San Diego-based Curts leaves on deployment for what is expected to be the last time in the ship's nearly 30 years of service. The Navy plans to decommission the 453-foot warship early next year as part of a larger program to replace frigates with the new littoral combat ship. There are only 21 frigates left, and NavyTimes.com says six will be taken out of service in 2013.

The Navy says the Curts will deploy to the Navy's Fourth Fleet area of responsibility, which takes in large parts of the Atlantic, Pacific and Caribbean. The ship will conduct an independent deployment focused on thwarting high seas drug trafficking.

The Curts was built during the height of the Cold War. But some of its most distinguished moments came in 1991 during Operation Desert Storm, when Navy and Army forces stationed on the frigate captured 51 Iraqi forces in the Persian Gulf. The ship also sank an Iraqi minelayer.

But as NavyTimes.com noted in a May 29th story, Navy brass quietly regard frigates as the "ghetto Navy" because the ships are old, they frequently break down, and they don't have the firepower of vessels like the Arleigh Burke destroyer. In fact, frigates no longer stock surface-to-air missiles.